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Introduction

You can manage child objects from their parent object's maintenance form, but users may have a business need to manage these objects from their own maintenance forms.

Prerequisites

• One-to-one relationship between child and parent tables.
• The parent form also must already exist.
• The parent maintenance form must have the child collection data table already configured.

Detailed Steps

Step 1. Click the Create New Item icon, then select New Page.

This opens a dropdown list from which you can select an object to begin its item wizard. The item wizard creates a file or files.

Step 2. Select the Page Type, then click Proceed.

This is the object you are creating. This example creates a maintenance form.

Step 3. Select the template.

This example uses a default template.

Step 4. Roll over the Form Layout, then click Choose.

Roll over the layout to choose the form based on how you want it to look to users.

This example uses the default maintenance layout.

Step 5. Enter the Form Details, then click Finish.

These are the same required form properties you configured when you created the parent form. In this example, that's the Order Maintenance form.

Step 6. Update the Section properties.

This example places Order entity fields in this section. Update the section's ID and caption to make it more meaningful.

Step 7. Add parent controls.

These are the Order fields.

This form's object is the Order Details object. The parent object, which is where the section fields will come from, is the Order object. Make sure a One To One relationship exists between those entities.

Step 8. Update the parent control properties.

You must change all the controls to labels so the user can't update the data from here.

Step 9. Add a collapsible control for form object fields.

You are going to put Order Details fields in this collapsible control. Add the collapsible control under the Order section.

Complete the wizard to place the collapsible control. The important properties are:

• Caption: Display name for the panel and sets the programmatic ID.
• Number of Row: Initial number of rows in the panel.
• Layout: Determines how many columns are in the row and how wide they are. Default is 3-3-3-3 (4 columns of equal width).

The Order Details Collapsible control is placed below the Order section. This collapsible control will contain the entity attributes from the Order Details entity.

Step 10. Add form object controls.

Open the entity tab and add controls to the collapsible control.

Step 11. Update the form object control properties.

For this example, open the Order Details ID label properties and make the label invisible.

Step 12. Save the form.

Step 13. Open the parent form, then open the desired container.

For this example, the parent form is wfmOrderMaintenance. This example adds buttons on this form to create/open Order Details records with wfmOrderDetailsMaintenance.

Open the container you are adding the buttons to. In this case, that is the Order Details collapsible control.

Step 14. Add a New button.

From the Actions section of the toolbox, drag the New button to the form and complete the wizard to place the button.

The important properties are:

• ID: Programmatic ID of the button.
• Visible: Determines whether the user can see the button.
• Text: Make sure the reader clearly understands what this button does, as opposed to all the other buttons. In this case, it is New Order Details Record.
• Active Form: The form that the button opens when clicked, In this case, it is wfmOrderDetailsMaintenance.

Xelence does not require the Navigation Parameter, only the Active Form.

Step 15. Add an Open button.

From the Actions section of the toolbox, drag the Open button to the form and complete the wizard to place the button.

This has all the same properties as a New button, except it needs a related control (data table whose record it'll open in the form). 

The buttons have been added.

Open the Open Order Details Record button properties and enter the Related Control.

Step 16. Add an Action Group control, if desired.

Drag the control from the toolbox and add it to the form.

Step 17. Group the two buttons, if desired.

Drag and drop the buttons and group them in the Action Group control.

Step 18. Change a data table column to a link.

This example uses the Order Details ID column as a link to the record. Open the label properties and make sure the control is a link action. This enables navigating to the child maintenance form. Also, enter the Related Control. In this case, it is actOpenOrderDetailsRecord. When the user clicks the link, the application behaves as though they have selected the record and clicked the Open button.

Step 19. Save the form.

Then, run the Preview. Xelence displays the form output. You can test your updated settings.

When you have previewed your form, it should look something like this. You can click the New button to create a new record or you can select a record and click the Open button to open the child record (or click the record link).

Click the Order Details Id linkable button to open a record in the child maintenance form.

What are the improvements over S3 Version 6?

The process is nearly identical. Button Group has been renamed to Action Group.

This post is part of the Maintenance Form topic. Click here to open the Maintenance Form Overview.

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